kids, math

Asian students do work harder.

I suspect that this is embedded in the culture, and probably comes from the defects of ideographic writing systems.

Alphabetic writing systems are simply more user friendly - they mesh better with the spoken language, are easier to learn and easier to retain.

Learning to write chinese characters takes a long time, and retaining them in memory seems to call for daily practice.

The chinese civil service was originally only drawn from families who had enough money to let their kids devote their time to learning to read and write, and to let the adults devote an hour so a day to reading to retain the skill.

Computers are now making life easier for chinese readers, but it's still a vile system.

I was a technician at a university, in a lab where students had to operate and modify a rig meant to represent an industrial process. It needed an extra hole drilled in the aluminium backplate and the students couldn't find the power drill (we only had one).

I found an old hand drill in a drawer and they looked incredulous when I told them it could be used to drill a hole. As I went to demonstrate it, the oriental students gathered round to watch and ask questions - the European students gave me a dirty look and walked out.

No, it was their project that just happend to be located in the lab I was working in.

The tools were shared between several labs and a general technicians' workshop, so nobody really owned them* and a lot of time could be wasted tracking them down. The students just needed a hole made and asked the nearest technician for help.

• This didn't result in a lot of thefts because most technicians already had a better selection of tools at home than they had at work. It wasn't unknown for me to take a morning off so as to make a part, needed for work, at home on my own lathe - or bring in my own equipment when it was needed in the lab.

Maybe the motivation is inadequate? Tell the CE graduates to learn that control system, or how to live without beer.

Joe

Notice that there are fewer (none?) homework problems showing up here . . . . probably thanks to some kind of chat engine. Easier than a search engine?

RL.

One of his graduates is a lady who ruins the gigantic Budweiser brewery near Sacramento.

John Larkin Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center Lunatic Fringe Electronics

oh no, the Soviets/Russians tried that in the Arctic, didn't really work out for them. :-)

ruins --> runs ?

Arie

I assume that someone actually still drinks that stuff.

John Larkin Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center Lunatic Fringe Electronics

What was their parent's net worth?

Poverty is a pretty good motivator towards doing what pays, and having parents with high NWs is often a good motivator to do just what you like.

It's not the old days when wealthy parents were like "You have to go out and make your own way in the world" lots of them are proud to pay for their kid's lifestyles, cars, and homes well after college.

I mean if you're annoyed people sometimes spend money to keep their dreams alive and give themselves purpose in life, even though those dreams don't always come to fruition, you're probably going to be annoyed a lot.

What are you hoping to tell them, "Put that money in a HYSA and find some other dream?" Even their wife probably failed at that, so don't feel too bad.

Spending $8400 over 7 years on a dream isn't going to break somebody if they weren't already on the verge of being broke, and isn't going to fix their situation, if broke is what they already are.

They wouldn't make it if they couldn't sell it, but the American public bought Donald Trump, so quite bit of it lacks discrimination.

Right. The other parents ... shouldn't have children to begin with.

And there's Foster's.

Trump count = 1. You're slacking off.

John Larkin Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center Lunatic Fringe Electronics

The point is that there is a "too late". Once they have their degree and apply for jobs it is too late.

In our present case the system was based on ugly STDbus boxes, probably Z80. I'm kinda grateful that there's no documentetion.

John Larkin Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center Lunatic Fringe Electronics

It was all over the map. Mostly not wealthy and then heavily going into student loan debt. A friend of mine had a brilliant idea: Instead of us taxpayers, universities should be underwriting student loans and be on the hook later if success doesn't materialize and defaulting begins. Then they'd quickly stop making lofty job prospect promises for career paths that don't have any.

Those folks often don't even want a degree (but won't say so in the beginning). After the first batch of rental appartments has been gifted over to them they throw in the towel in terms of studies and buy a sports car.

Yes, unfortunately. Which result in lots of boomerang kids who live on their parent's dime and often in their parent's house at 40 or 50.

That was just one example. Those families almost always make dozens more such misguided decisions simultaneously and that keeps them permanently under water. Avoidably so. $250/mo cell phone bills, $150/mo streaming bills, $1000/mo in payments for their cars, the daily $12 expense at a coffee shop (times two), et cetera.

Best to start on electronics while you're a kid.

A mentor sure helps.

Few college EE profs have ever had a real job.

John Larkin Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center Lunatic Fringe Electronics

Absolutely. It's also important to start "cross-mentoring" among students at high school, gets you into the grove of real mentoring later (giving back). In essence we did a lot of brain storming back then. I knew a lot about analog, others knew a lot about the up and coming 7400 series logic, so we complemented each.

When one of them told us that a grounded base structure for a FET amplifier is nonsensical I stopped attending and just sat for the exam (in Germany there was no requirement to attend). But not before showing him the schematic of my ham radio transceiver. He couldn't believe what he saw.

I wonder if the typical EE education makes people good at designing electronics. I think not.

John Larkin Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center Lunatic Fringe Electronics